"Loss of Biodiversity": A True Measure of Sustainability?

Preventing the “Loss of Biodiversity” May Provide the True Measure of Our Efforts to Sustainably Produce Food

In general, the governments of the world agree that agriculture, wild fisheries and aquaculture

must become more sustainable in order to feed the Earth’s growing population.  Most often, progress in sustainability efforts are measured and indexed throughout the world by referencing localized improvements.  For example, off the West Coast of the United States, the wild Oregon pink shrimp fishery has been certified to be sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council.  However, to gage our sustainability successes in more global terms, we may want to apply a unifying metric such as “Loss of Biodiversity”.  This “Loss of Biodiversity” is defined as the extinction of the world’s plant and animal species that can be attributed to a complex mix of human causes such as over fishing/hunting, habitat destruction, introduction of invasive species, pollution, global warming, etc.

By applying this “Loss of Biodiversity” metric, we are forced to look at our  biosphere  as a single ecological unit in which humans play the dominant role yet are dependent upon the biodiversity of plants and animals for their survival.

According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, in the last 500 years, human activity is known to have forced 869 species into extinction.  However, other scientists believe that species are currently going extinct at a much faster rate than at any other time in history except for the past periods of geologic and cosmic cataclysmic events.  Some scientists believe that the greatest threat to our future quality of life and even to our survival is the loss of the Earth’s biodiversity.

The United Nations has set goals to stop the extinction of plant and animal species that are caused by human activities by establishing the Convention on Biological Diversity.  This UN program addresses our entire biosphere and includes special projects to halt marine and freshwater species loss.

The “Loss of Biodiversity” may ultimately be the unifying and defining metric that tells us if we have indeed made positive improvements in sustainably producing our food from the Earth’s aquatic and terrestrial resources.  Let’s hope that we truly make progress in preventing the ”Loss of Biodiversity” so that our future dinner plates will be full of a rich genetic variety of food stuffs and that the productive capacity of our beautiful biosphere will have been preserved.

Please feel free to leave any comments……would love to hear from you…….Sincerely, Dave